Castaway Cove Party Games

Maddie was our photographer again this morning for KidPak, and it was a fun morning with the kids for some Castaway Cove games.  The series is a light-touch on skits and so forth, as we're focusing on Forward and Summer Xtreme.  But we're definitely having somewhat of a beach party here, and the kids are pretty loud and loving it.  Maddie took so many great pictures again, I couldn't share them all with the church staff account.  And of course here, I only have a few of them.  She's doing very well technically, and her eye for composition is very good too.  

Oh, one more thing this morning:  baptisms!  Our good friend Emma was baptized this morning, and she gave a shout-out to KidPak and the Easter production and Christmas production - she's got an amazing testimony about those productions.  She was a dancer for us, dancing for the "Son of Suffering" song as Jesus carried the cross on stage.  And she didn't even know the full story of Easter then.  Only after she watched the video for it later did it grip her - she accepted Jesus right then.  And here we are, three years later or so, getting baptized!  We were so glad the story came out so Pastor Franklin could hear it himself.

After church we went over to Aunt Shain's house, and there we celebrated a few birthdays, and the Fourth of July as well.  It was a nice big meal with burgers and the usual summer food spread.  They always do nice for Mom, making gluten-free options for her.  It was nice to be together as a family, and there was a lot to talk about and share, including stories from Nana and Ye-Ye about their recent trip to Montana.  And of course Maddie's recent accident with a sword!

We got home after that, and Maddie and I tried a level of Tropical Freeze, and I did my walking and we watched an episode of "The Chosen," revisiting some of season four before we continue into uncharted territory later in the season.  And we also watched "The Empire Strikes Back" too - that was because we're done with the one "From a Certain Point of View" book, and we're moving on to the edition tied to "Return of the Jedi" next.  "The Empire Strikes Back is one of my favorite movies ever. It's still so good, and I still catch new things each time.  Of course, we have a few backstories to add, and some others from the book we choose to ignore because they're not written all that well.  Just like the previous Expanded Universe stuff that was replaced.

Anyway, we said our prayers tonight, after reading of course.  And then it was time for some sleep.  I'm tired!